SAS leads the charge for pharmaceutical data transparency

Will serve as neutral third party to allow companies to provide easy, controlled access to clinical trials data for research

DIA 2013 49TH ANNUAL MEETING, BOSTON
(27 juin 2013)

Predictive analytics leader SAS is playing a key role in the development of an emerging industry-wide collaborative toward pharmaceutical data transparency. The initiative aims to unlock a wealth of insight from clinical trials data to benefit researchers and the public. SAS is building a secure, globally accessible data and analysis environment where multiple organizations can make available anonymized clinical trial information. As a trusted analytics provider for more than three decades, SAS is working to bring together pharmaceutical leaders including GlaxoSmithKline (GSK).

The impetus for the global project was SAS working with GSK to create a secure online data and analysis environment that allows researchers to gain access to patient-level clinical trial data. The program objectives have expanded to support the goal for a larger, independent environment led by SAS for the benefit of all pharmaceutical researchers.

SAS is in initial discussions with additional pharmaceutical companies that will contribute to the repository and allow controlled access to users who want to combine or compare information from around the globe. Researchers and consumers will also benefit from tools to visualize, explore and analyze the data.

"Liberating this data will help advance scientific understanding and empower the scientific community to learn from the research and more quickly and effectively improve care for patients with all kinds of diseases and disorders, from diabetes to ADHD," said Matt Gross, Business Director, SAS Health and Life Sciences. "The value has the potential to be greatly enhanced as researchers are able to gain access to data from multiple companies through a single site."

Commenting on its recently launched SAS-supported system enabling researchers to request access to anonymized patient-level data that sit behind the results of its clinical trials, Perry Nisen, GlaxoSmithKline's Senior Vice President for Science and Innovation, said "In sharing our data with researchers around the world, we hope to further scientific research and increase understanding about our medicines. Our goal is to see this initiative transition to a broader system allowing researchers to access data from trials conducted by multiple organizations."

Project Data Sphere initiative

This collaboration with GSK isn't the first time SAS has stepped up to further pharmaceutical data transparency. SAS hosts a shared data platform for the Project Data Sphere initiative led by the CEO Roundtable on Cancer's Life Sciences Consortium. For this program, SAS and life sciences organizations such as Sanofi are collaborating with health advocacy groups, medical data standards organizations, contract research companies and universities to create a data sharing environment that honors patient participation in research trials by using historic research findings that aid in developing more effective therapies for future patients.

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